


Asking For It

by scribensdracones



Series: One-Shots for Friends [2]
Category: Noblesse (Manhwa)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-14
Updated: 2020-03-14
Packaged: 2021-03-01 04:14:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,584
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23139046
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scribensdracones/pseuds/scribensdracones
Summary: Life is precious. Never brag about taking it.
Series: One-Shots for Friends [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1759711
Comments: 2
Kudos: 9





	Asking For It

**Author's Note:**

  * For [foggywizard](https://archiveofourown.org/users/foggywizard/gifts).



> A big thank you for Foggy, who had this idea in the first place. And then I went ahead and made it worse.

Claudia never asked for much. She never asked for glory or power, did not want material wealth and never asked to rise above her standing. Polite and soft-spoken, demure and kind. Was it so selfish to ask just for a single thing for herself? For five hundred years, she had only asked for one thing: for her beloved to return home. But when father came, she was not by his sides and Claudia did not know whether she had managed to save herself or never lived to join him in the first place. Had she known that Ignes was in the werewolf lands, she would have saved her. But she had not known first, and things had gone so horribly wrong.

“This tea blend is delicious,” he praised and Claudia's smile remained glued to her face, an impenetrable mask of friendliness. She was Claudia Tradio and everyone in Lukedonia knew that she was a lady of kindness, virtue and gentleness. No one could say the same of Frankenstein. Indeed, even now as he sat alone in her tea room, she found him unbearable. How could he smile like that and be and ease with the things he had done? She did not care about what he did to Gradeus. Indeed, maybe she even could have brought herself to let it slide. Her hand trembled ever so slightly as she brought up the teacup to take a sip. Indeed, this tea was delicious, but she was a generous woman, and did not even feel like it was wasted on her visitor.

“Could it be possible to have sent over to the Noblesse's residence? It would bring him great joy,” Frankenstein continued, and Claudia responded with a gentle nod.  
“Of course, Frankenstein. I will be happy to have someone send it over.”  
“Thank you.” Frankenstein responded with a nod before taking another sip of the tea.

For two years, she had worked on this. Even if her skin crawled at the mere thought of him, she had always smiled and smiled and smiled until her face had gone numb. She had endured him bragging about the way she had died, with tears streaming over her face, begging for her life. Her pleas had met deaf ears and each word stung in a way she could never make him repay. Whenever he left, she cried. It hurt. It hurt. It hurt. It's been years and it still hurt and it would never stop hurting. He might be sophisticated and perfectly capable of being polite, and he had a sharp humor some might appreciate, but despite this, Claudia failed to find a single saving grace about him, even though she fooled him into thinking she was a friend.

Frankenstein's facial expression strained subtly. “I probably won't stay long this time, I am afraid. I do not feel too well.”  
“Nonsense.” Claudia smiled gently. “Do you feel unwell?” She set down her teacup and stood to move over, sitting down next to him. Carefully, she brought up her hand and placed her fingertips against his warm forehead. Ah. His body fought the poison, as she had expected it. In fact... this was a problem. But it should at least stop him from summoning that hellish weapon of his.

“I do not wish to disturb,” Frankenstein assured, though when Claudia used her telekinetic powers to close the doors and windows, a certain understanding dawned. This was the moment they would stop the pleasantries and Claudia could, at last, reveal her true feelings. She would do it with her bare hands. Despite everything, Frankenstein was just a human.

“I thought there was something redeemable about you,” she whispered as she pinned him down harder, both hands tightly wrapped around his neck. “I thought I could forgive you. But I can't. I can't. I can't.”

She could feel how betrayed he felt. He was angry. He was confused. He did not even _understand_ why she could not let him leave and it brought tears to her eyes. Her whole life, Claudia could not even bring herself to harm an animal for her father's research and here she was, now, killing someone with bare hands. It was terrifying and more importantly, inevitable. “You _slaughtered_ her!”, she cried out, and in this moment, she could see it in his eyes despite her tears blurring her vision. He understood. How could he forget that he had killed Claudia's beloved in cold blood?

“For five hundred years... I wanted nothing. As long as she came back to me safe and sound, I asked for nothing! I wanted nothing but to be with her, my whole life! And you took it!” Bones cracked under the force she used and under her own sobs, she almost did not hear it. “ **You took it and you were proud of it!** ”

With strangled noises, Frankenstein managed to reach for the teacup on the side table just about – and smashed the dainty porcelain over Claudia's head, throwing her off just enough to push her away and let a kick follow to free himself. A clan leader trying to kill him, in her own home – he never would have thought it possible. Least of all Claudia, who pursued no goal other than revenge. Wheezing, he scrambled up to his feet. She had poisoned him – and while she was collapsed on the couch, all tears and sobs, he needed to get out. His hand almost reached the handle of the door, when something pierced his legs and brought him down. Like tentacles, the vines of Dolors wrapped around him, tied through the wound they had stabbed through his calves.

“I can't let you leave, Frankenstein,” Claudia whispered, standing tall and proud with the weapon of her father in her hands. “I must free her.” Ignes' soul was still trapped in that weapon Frankenstein dared to call his lover. If she could not save her, she would free her, at least.

She had wanted to look into his eyes when the life faded from them. But now... slowly, she stepped closer. Frankenstein had been so close to Ignes, he must have felt her last breath and she knew he'd laughed and now it was her turn to laugh.

“Curse you, Claudia!”, he bellowed and her maniacal laughter, disrupted by sobs, turned into a genuine laugh. Did he really dare cursing her? He, the most cursed man in this world?

“You only make me want to kill you even more!”, she cried out in a sharp, high-pitched cry, and drove the bottom end of Dolor through his chest in lack of a dagger. Despite everything, she did not want his cursed blood on her hands. She barely wanted his blood on her floor. This was supposed to be a neat, clear affair, but if he refused to die of poison and of strangulation, let him die like that.

He coughed out blood in her face, eyes dulling with the realization that this was the end of the fantastical Frankenstein. She had pretended to be his friend just to lure him into visiting her with his guard down. Claudia smiled wearily and, with her free hand, briefly touched his cheek. “Did you really think I was your friend?”, she asked, softly, and for the first time in her life, she enjoyed the feeling of someone else's suffering. “You were proud of the way you killed her. But life is so precious. Even your enemies have people who love them. I _**loved** _ her. And you took her life. You did so with pride. How can I _not_ punish you?” She had no more tears left to cry, and her voice was coarse, smaller than the words it had to carry.

“You... Frankenstein... are the most despicable person I ever met. You were asking for it.” She let Dolor dissolve and watched him collapse on the floor. And slowly, she sank to her knees next to him. She could feel him, and she could feel his soul being devoured by the very same thing he had trapped within himself for so long. “Ignes... I know you can hear me... you are free now.”

But Dark Spear did not work like that. Dark Spear was hungry – and as Frankenstein's soul was, at last, consumed by the nightmare he created, Claudia realized that his death would not release Ignes and the other souls trapped. The darkness filled this room, clawing at her and she knew: she would not have the strength to contain it herself. Her heart was too soft to bear the Dark Spear. Maybe that was alright too. With a trembling hand, Claudia reached out towards the dark. Though she could not save Ignes... though she could not set her soul free... at least she could join her.

“I give my soul to you freely,” she whispered, weeping with silent tears. She was a dead woman anyway. She had murdered this man and she would have to pay the price. Maybe someone else would come and destroy this weapon and release all the souls trapped within. But until then... She smiled as she felt it tearing apart her very being.

Until the day Dark Spear was destroyed and released its damned souls, she and Ignes would be one. No, Claudia never had feared death. Only separation. She would rather condemn herself and let this Dark Spear take her than tolerate an eternity of being apart from Ignes. If they could not live together, let them be damned together.


End file.
